Head Coach Rich Axtell

Head Coach Rich Axtell founded Minuteman in 1998. Rich\'s coaching career began in 1993 as a recreation league coach. In 1994 Rich transitioned to USS club coaching. Working closely with a former Olypmic coach, Rich quickly developed a passion for swimming excellence. This passion grew into a desire to cultivate fast swimming in all his swimmers from walk-on to national qualifier. Rich has coached scores of USMS Top 10 athletes, NEM record holders, All Americans, and Olympic Trial Qualifiers. In addition to his success in coaching competitive swimmers, Rich specializes in coaching the swim leg of triathlon. Rich has worked with triathlete\'s of all abilities including Iron Man World Champion Karen Smyers. Currently Rich is the swim coach for 2008 Olympian Jarrod Shoemaker, up-and-comer Ethan Brown, and several other elite\'s. Rich\'s philosophy of "team" is evident in his teachings on deck with Minuteman. Rich has been credited with embracing the swimming-for-life philosophy of United States Masters Swimming and coaching swimmers of all abilities to their potential.

Education: Level 5, American Swim Coaches Association, Bachelor\'s degree in Business Management, Master\'s degree Business Admistration.

Community Involvement: NEM Board of Directors, NEM LMSC Coaches Rep, Member of Grace Community Church, Chelmsford MA

Home Life: Rich leads a balanced life at home with his wife Kelly, daughter Kaylee, and son Mason. Rich and family reside in Bedford, MA.

Coach Rick Battistini

Coach "Batt" has been coaching all levels of competitive swimming in the Merrimack Valley for over 25 years. As Haverhill YMCA head coach from 1978-1985 his team won several New England YMCA championship titles and had more All-Americans than any other team in the state. His accomplishments with that club included several New England Age Group and Senior champions. In one year coaching with the Lowell YMCA in 1986, Rick had several YMCA and New England Age Group and Senior champions, including a New England Team Division champion and Lowell YMCA\'s first All-American. Rick was the founding coach of the Merrimack Valley Pirates, which included three Junior Olympic All-Americans. Coach Batt recently recorded his 200th dual meet victory as head coach of the Haverhill High School girls varsity team, and is also the head coach of the Lowell High School boys varsity team. He graduated from Bridgewater State College in 1977 with a B.S. in Physical Education, with an emphasis in aquatics. He was a varsity record holder there while being named Collegiate All-East in the 200 Meter Individual Medley. Some of his awards include the 1985 National Coaches Excellence Award, the 1992 Boston Globe Coach of the Year, and the 1993 New England Swimming Age Group Coach of the Year. Coach Batt is a three event National Masters Champion, and he has earned a Level 4 American Swim Coaches Association ranking, putting him in the top 10% of swim coaches nationwide. Coach Batt was recently inducted into the Massachusetts Swim Coaches Hall of Fame. Coach Batt resides in Haverhill and spends his time off deck helping to manage the Battistini family business Haverhill TV & Appliance.

Coach Ann Boudrot

 Coach Ann swam at Belmont High School and then went on to compete at the collegiate level at Springfield College. Ann is well connected to the local sports scene. Ann has been coaching girls swimming at the Academy of Notre Dame in Tyngsboro for 4 years, Lincoln Sudbury boys and girls swimming for 5 years, and girls tennis at Lincoln Sudbury for 4 years.  Ann devoted 13 years to the Thoreau Club in Concord as Aquatics Director, Programmer, and Manager on Duty. Ann now champions a reading program in the Billerica School system called Power Lunch were local business people come in and read to students during lunch break. Ann spends summers working at White Pond in Concord. Ann seized a great opportunity to diversify her experience and ived in Japan for 1 year as a sports instructor at the Toyko YMCA.
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\r\nOutside the sporting and aquatic world, Ann\'s interests include photography, cooking, and watching her own 3 kids play sports. Ann resides in Billerica with her husband and kids.
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Coach Marc Broudy

Coach Marc co-founded Minuteman with longtime friend Coach Rich. Marc is a 1993 graduate of national champion Kenyon College with a degree in chemistry. While at Kenyon, Marc was a four time NCAA national qualifier and an NCAA All-American. When not on deck with Minuteman, Marc coaches USS Swimming with New Wave Swim Club. Marc has coached numerous age group, senior, and national qualifiers, as well as masters national champions. Marc has pioneered new programs and training techniques during the course of his coaching career, and has a critical eye for technique. By day Marc is a chemist working in Cambridge, MA. Marc resides in Billerica and lays claim to an awesome "man-town" within his residence.

Coach David Fair

Coach David is a coach who is passionate about helping people to learn and grow. His swimming experience began with a small summer team the summer after 6tth grade at Ankara Air Station in Ankara, Turkey where his father was stationed in the US Air Force. Even though the team was more of a front whose real purpose was to provide day care for children who lived at the base, he found that he picked it up very quickly, and by the end of his second full summer he was the highest scoring swimmer in his age group, and among the top five on his team. In 1991 the Air Force moved his family to the Boston area where David completed high school. It was here that David began to swim all year round for the Bernal\'s Gator Swim Club, and here he improved rapidly. Despite the fact that he was not able to swim at Stanford, where he earned a BS in Mechanical Engineering in 1999, he gained \"extracurricular experience\" by rowing with the Stanford Varsity Crew. On the Crew, David picked up a solid understanding of the way the body generates power in motion through alignment, balance, and core strength. He also learned many lessons about life balance the hard way. Eventually realizing that this was not a sport he was cut out for, he returned to his roots after graduating by coaching the Health Point Masters Swim Team in Waltham for four years. Graduate school at Tufts University sucked up all his free time for a period, and now David is excited to be back on deck and back in the pool doing and teaching the sport that he loves. David has a strong command of every competitive stroke, but specializes in the butterfly and the freestyle. He has an unusual ability to help people conceptualize physical concepts and put them in motion. You can find David on deck at Bosse Sports on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings.

Coach Karen Fair

Coach Karen Fair was a late bloomer in the sport of swimming. At age 25, she joined the US Masters team of which her brother (David) was the Assistant Coach to Kristin Lilly (1988 Olympic Trials). Karen dove right in to swim for fitness but vowed to “never, ever, ever compete”. After reading every swimming book she could get her hands on and then discussing with her current coach, Karen was hooked and a hot streak of swimming and coaching would run parallel. Karen was hired on to coach the age group team at Healthpoint in Waltham, MA, and started competing herself. With two New England relay records (200m Medley and 200m Free) and three National Top 10 times (800m Free, One Hour Swim, One Hour Swim relay) to her name, as well as numerous regional and open water podium finishes (including 2nd place in the 2-man relay division of the Swim Around Key West, June 2009), she has a passion for racing, and a deep commitment to the community of coaches and athletes that got her there. Her current swimming focus is to become a National Long Distance All-Star for 2010. In addition to her swimming and coaching, Karen is writing human-interest features for her Boston Swimming Examiner column at Examiner.com. She never gets tired of hearing about the goals and journeys of her sport-mates, whether they are at a fitness or elite level, and is thrilled at the possibility of being a part of making those goals a reality.

Coach Maeve Lien

Coach Maeve is originally from Gillette, Wyoming and has been a competitive swimmer since age 5. Maeve joined Minuteman in 2005 as standout swimmer. Her areas of expertise include distance freestyle training and shoulder safe Scapular Plane swimming technique. Maeve was a top three finisher at the 2006 USMS SCY Nationals in the 1000 freestyle and 50 breaststroke and Wyoming state champion in the 500 yard freestyle with an undefeated career record in dual meets. She has previously coached age group and master’s swimming developing podium finishers and cultivating novice swimmers. Maeve earned her bachelor’s degree in Music Education and a Master’s in Music from New England Conservatory in Boston. She currently works at the Fenn School in Concord, All Newton Music School, and is an active freelance musician.
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Coach Sue Sotir

Sue began coaching masters swimming at age 19 while a student and Div 3 swimmer. She continued coaching after college, and began swimming masters while in grad school. 19 years of coaching has solidified her belief that fast swimming is a combination of technique, endurance, and intensity- no magic involved.

Coaching Highlights: USS: age group, seniors, junior and senior nationals qualifiers

High School: Thayer Academy, Wellesley High School including 2 league championships, numerous school records, individual and relay state level podium finishers, 1 individual state champion, 5 years as a top 5 team at Div. 2 state championships

Masters: SCM Champions 2005/2006/2008, SCY Champions 2005

Competitive Highlights: USMS Relay All American and triathlons; sprint distance through Ironman.